No matter how you store fresh garlic, over time it dries out or rots. Preserving garlic by pickling it gives it a longer shelf life. Pickled garlic takes on its own flavor, which is slightly different than fresh garlic, although the basic notes all taste the same. Whether you're a die-hard garlic chomper or just want to keep the vampires away, there's an easy pickling recipe for you.

Pickling Spices

2 tbsp (30 ml) mustard seed

1 tbsp (15 ml) whole peppercorn

1 tbsp (15 ml) whole cloves

1 tbsp (15 ml) ground coriander

4 sprigs of thyme

4 bay leaves

Steps

Part 1

Preparing the Brine and Garlic

1

Prepare the jars for pickling. Before you start, you want to make sure that you don't introduce bacteria into your canning jars. The slightest bit of contamination can ruin a perfectly good batch of garlic, so make sure they're sterilized properly beforehand. After sterilized, put them on a freshly cleaned towel on the kitchen counter to air-dry.

Perhaps the easiest way to do this is to wash the jars and lids in the dishwasher on the "sterilize" cycle. If you do not have a dishwasher or a dishwasher with a sterilize function, put the jars and lids into boiling water for 10 minutes to sterilize them.

When handling freshly-sterilized cans and lids, use clean tongs or canning tongs. Any interaction between human skin and the jars or lids could transfer unwanted bacteria.

Try not to use old jam or jelly jars as your canning jars, as these don't preserve properly. Instead, opt for mason jars. If you want to use old jam jars, you'll need to keep your pickled garlic refrigerated at all times and use it up within three months.

2

Put a clean canner on the burner over low heat. You can let it heat up while you prepare the garlic and pickling solution for canning.

3

Peel the garlic. When you're dealing in bulk, peeling one pound of garlic can get tedious. You'll want to peel those suckers efficiently. There are two basic ways you can peel a lot of garlic very quickly:

Shake them up. Break up the garlic bulbs and place the cloves into a metal bowl. Invert another identical metal bowl over the first bowl to create a locked seal. Grip the bowls tightly with both hands and shake vigorously for up to 30 seconds. Your cloves should be completely peeled!

Blanch the garlic. Break up the garlic bulbs and sink into boiling water for 30 seconds. Remove and put them into cold water to stop the cooking. Separate the peel from the clove in the water. The peels should easily slide off after they are blanched.

4

Prepare the brine. Mix together the water, vinegar, and salt in a pot and bring to a simmer. Make sure the salt is completely dissolved

Use a stainless steel, teflon, porcelain or glass pot. Do not use a copper pot; too much copper present in the water may cause the garlic to turn green or blue.

Part 2

Pickling the Garlic

1

Fill each jar with desired spices and herbs. Four pint-sized mason jars should accommodate one pound of garlic. Into each of the four mason jars, place 1/4 of the desired spices, along with one sprig of thyme and one bay leaf.

2

Fill the jars evenly with the remaining garlic cloves. Be careful not to overstuff — all garlic should eventually be fully submerged in the pickling solution.

3

Add enough pickling solution to fully cover garlic in each jar, then top with a slice of lemon to keep the garlic under the pickling solution.[1] Wipe the mouths of the jars to remove any pickling solution. Screw the lid on securely, but do not over-tighten it. The process of heating and cooling the jars will create an airtight seal.

4

Get the canner going. Raise the temperature on the burner under the canner to bring the water to a slow boil. Put the jars of garlic into the canner using jar tongs.

Add more boiling water to the canner if necessary to bring the water level to at least 1 inch (2.5 cm) over the tops of the jars.

Place a metal standing tray on the bottom of your canner for the mason jars to rest atop. The mason jars may break if they sit on the bottom of the canner, next to the direct heat from the burner.

5

Leave the jars in the canner, on low boil, for 15 minutes. The process of heating the pickling solution up — and then eventually cooling it down — will create a vacuum seal in the headspace, preserving the garlic.

6

Remove the jars from the hot water and allow to cool completely. Take care not to tilt the jars when removing them. Make sure the jars are sealed properly with this simple trick:

After they are completely cool, push on the center of each jar to see if it pops up and down. If it does, the jar has not sealed properly.

Restart the canning process with the jars that didn't seal if you have too many to use up quickly. Use new lids on the jars and leave them in the canner for the full 15 minutes again.

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Video

Tips

Pickled garlic may also turn blue or green if the garlic used was immature or was not fully dry. Red skinned varieties of garlic also may turn blue or green once pickled. Color changes in the garlic are not an indication of the garlic being bad and it may still be eaten.

Warnings

If you've canned your garlic, and opening the jar doesn't produce a hissing sounds from the vacuum in the jar, consider not eating the contents of the jar. This probably means that the contents of the jar were not canned properly, and could cause botulism.